On February 20th (See 'Happiness Is An Inside Job') I suggested contemplating the question: “What am I willing to have get in the way of my experience of happiness?”
20 years of coaching people has given me a clear answer to this question. These are the things that people choose over happiness: petty grievances, annoyance, frustration, complaint, anger, resentment, judgment, blame, worry, and fear. Sounds crazy, right? Why would anyone choose any of these over happiness?
The reason is simple - We don't realize that choosing the emotions/mind states on that list obscures the experience of our innate happiness. We have been conditioned to believe that everything on that list is a normal part of everyday life. And believing makes it so. That list is a virtual table of contents for your day to day experience of life. Please do NOT take my word for it. It is far more powerful to discover this for yourself.
I encourage you to keep a mind/emotion journal for a few days. Write or print out the above list of emotions/mind states on a piece of paper and keep it with your journal/list. Read the list in the morning to remind yourself of the thoughts and feelings you are going to record, and then - at the end of your day do a mental review and write down a brief notation of any that show up. If you can review more than once per day, you will get a lot more out of this because we all quickly forget what occurs during our days. And because we are so accustomed to running these emotions and mind states, and accepting them as natural, it takes practice to notice when they are happening.
Am I suggesting that one can live life without regularly running the above list? Yes. Absolutely. And the first step is becoming aware of their presence and impact. In future posts I will discuss the exact nature of petty grievances, annoyance, frustration, complaint, anger, resentment, judgment, blame, worry, and fear; as well as how one can limit the presence of these emotions and mind states in daily life.
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